Learn how to work with video clips in Adobe Prelude

Adobe Prelude software is a video ingest and logging tool that helps you quickly tag and transcode raw footage from file-based cameras. It is an open platform that supports customized integration with third-party technologies and management systems.

Workflow

1. Create a project / Open an existing project

Adobe Prelude creates a project (.plproj) file for every project that you create in Prelude. The project file contains references to the media you add to your project.

A project file stores only references to the source files that you ingest. For this reason, project files remain fairly small. Because only references to the source files are stored, you don't need to worry about moving, renaming, or deleting your source files. If media files are moved or renamed, you can reconnect such media to your project using the Relink command available in the File menu.

2. Ingest raw footage

Ingest entire movie clips, or only portions of a clip (partial ingest). Choose a codec that best suits your editing requirements.

File-size and byte-level checks help you immediately identify whether the footage was ingested successfully.

3. Organize ingested footage

You can reorder the sequence of clips by moving them in the project view. Use bins to organize project contents much as you use folders to organize files. Bins can contain clips, subclips, and rough cuts.

4. Log video clips

Use interface options or keyboard shortcuts to add temporal metadata to clips, and create subclips. Markers and other temporal metadata help you quickly organize and search clips. You can leverage the metadata information when you export to other software such as Adobe Premiere Pro.

5. Create rough cuts

Create rough cuts from clips and subclips before sending them to other software such as Adobe Premiere Pro for final editing.

6. Export to Adobe Premiere Pro/Final Cut Pro

You can export rough cuts, clips, subclips, and bins to an Adobe Premiere Pro project or FCP XML file. Alternatively, you can send the rough cut to Adobe Premiere Pro directly for editing.

The organization and metadata information from Prelude is carried over to Adobe Premiere Pro. This seamless workflow reduces post-production time and effort when you create the final cut of a movie.

Extending Prelude

Adobe technical partners can use the Prelude SDK to customize Prelude.